On June 1 through 19 exercise Saber Strike 15 held concurrently in the three Baltic States and Poland will train roughly 6 thousand troops from 13 NATO allies and partner nations. It will concentrate the most numerous allied capabilities on the soil of Lithuania since accessing NATO.

The overall goal of the U.S. Army Europe-organised international Exercise Saber Strike 15 is to develop and enhance the cooperation in planning and executing military operations, improving professionalism of military personnel and training to render Host Nation Support.

This year brigade-level Command Post Exercise (CPX) and planning procedures will be based at the General Adolfas Ramanauskas Warfare Training Centre (Nemenčinė) and train staffs of brigades from 5 NATO allies, Denmark, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and the USA. Battalion-level field training exercise (FTX) and situational fire exercises will be running concurrently in Latvia’s, Lithuania’s, and Poland’s military training areas.

“This exercise is an opportunity to give one more demonstration of both, our armed forces’ and our strategic partners’ abilities to organise military drills of such scope together and to continue honing interoperability,” the Officer Scheduling the Exercise in Lithuania, Commander of the Lithuanian Land Force Major General Almantas Leika said.

FTXs in Lithuania involving roughly 1,600 soldiers from across the Lithuanian Land Force and roughly 900 soldiers from deployed or rotating US, German, Portuguese ground units and Canadian and Slovenian tactical air control units will take place at the Gaižiūnų (Rukla) and the General Silvestras Žukauskas (Pabradė) Training Areas.

Exercise Saber Strike 15 will also certify the Baltic Battalion (BALTBAT) preparing for standby for the NATO Response Force (NRF) in 2016. BALTBAT formed by Lithuanian, Latvian and Estonian militaries is a combined Baltic contribution to the NATO Response Force. Lithuania’s input into BALTBAT is a company and a headquarters element of King Mindaugas Hussar Battalion.

Lithuania is the main host nation for Exercise Saber Strike 15. The exercise will officially declared open at the ceremonies in Pabradė and Rukla on June 8.

Saber Strike is an annual exercise held by the U.S. Army Europe in the Baltic States. Saber Strike 15 is the fifth iteration of the series held in Lithuania. The part of the exercise in Lithuania will involve roughly 1.6 thousand Lithuanian military and 1.5 thousand troops from 8 NATO countries – Denmark, Estonia, Latvia, Portugal, USA, Germany, Slovenia and Canada.

Roughly 1 thousand of Portuguese, US and German military personnel have brought an impressive arsenal of military armament for the FTX in Lithuania: the ABRAMS tanks, the STRYKER, the BOXER, the PANDUR and the FUCHS wheeled armoured personnel carriers and the EAGLE IV and the DINGO II armoured reconnaissance vehicles. Allied troops have been training with this equipment in combined exercises in Lithuania since April.

For the Media:

On June 1 Commander of the Lithuanian Land Force Major General Almantas Leika, Co-Director of the Exercise in Lithuania, will hold a press conference and present the exercise at the Ministry of National Defence (Totorių str. 25) on June 1. The press conference starts at 10.30 a.m. at the MoD Black Hall (ground floor).